2014 Golden Globes: Biggest audience in a decade

By Brian Stelter, CNN

Updated 6:07 PM ET, Mon January 13, 2014

2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Tina Fey and Amy Poehler host the 71st Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, California, on Sunday, January 12. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association's annual event is often looked at as an Academy Awards predictor. It also honors the best in television.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Director Steve McQueen and the cast of the film "12 Years a Slave" accept the award for best drama.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Matthew McConaughey accepts the award for best actor in a drama for his performance in the film "Dallas Buyers Club."

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Actress Emma Thompson holds a martini in one hand and her shoes in the other while presenting an award.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock present the award for best supporting actress in a motion picture. Jennifer Lawrence won for her role in the movie "American Hustle."

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Lawrence accepts her award. The film also won best motion picture in the musical or comedy category.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Melissa McCarthy and Jimmy Fallon present the award for best actor in a miniseries or TV movie. It was won by Michael Douglas for his performance in the HBO movie "Behind the Candelabra."

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Jon Voight, who stars in the Showtime series "Ray Donovan," accepts the award for best supporting actor in a series, miniseries or TV movie.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Adam Clayton, Bono, The Edge and Larry Mullen Jr. of U2 accept the award for best original song. The song "Ordinary Love" was produced by Danger Mouse and is from the film "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom."

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Andy Samberg accepts the award for best actor in a comedy TV series. His show "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" also won best series in its category.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Kyra Sedgwick, left, and Kevin Bacon, third from left, are interrupted while introducing their daughter Sosie Bacon, right, as this year's Miss Golden Globe. Fey, second from left, jokes that her adult son Randy, played by Poehler, second from right, is Mr. Golden Globe "in the name of gender equality."

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Amy Adams, who starred in "American Hustle," accepts the award for best actress in a motion picture (musical or comedy).

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Vince Gilligan, left, and the cast of "Breaking Bad" accept the award for best TV series in the drama category.

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2014 Golden Globes: The show15 photos

2014 Golden Globes: The show – Fey and Poehler take the stage with glasses of wine.

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Story highlights

The 2014 Golden Globes had its highest total audience in 10 years

According to Nielsen, the average total audience was 20.9 million

That's up from last year's 19.7 million total audience

There was also an uptick in ratings in the key demographic of adults 18-49

More than 20 million people watched the Golden Globes on Sunday night, the highest total audience for the awards show in 10 years.

The strong ratings for the Globes were another affirmation that live awards shows are a boon to television networks in this age of increasingly time-shifted viewing.

According to Nielsen, the average total audience during the three-hour broadcast was 20.9 million, up from 19.7 million last year. The network that televised the awards, NBC, pulled a 6.5 rating in the key advertiser demographic of adults ages 18 to 49, an uptick from last year's 6.4 rating.

NBC said the total viewer number was the Globes' best since 2004, when the program drew 26.8 million viewers.

On the Internet, Nielsen SocialGuide, which measures the reach of Twitter messages, found that 2.36 million messages about the Globes reached a total of 10.4 million users on Sunday night.

Entertainment Weekly, which like CNN is owned by Time Warner, observed that "any ratings boost could be seen as another endorsement of hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, who hosted the show for the second year in a row. They are also signed to host the awards next year."

The red carpet arrivals special on NBC, hosted by the cast of the "Today" show, also performed well. It averaged more than 10 million viewers between 7 and 8 p.m. ET. The competing red carpet special on E! averaged 2.2 million viewers between 6 and 8 p.m. ET, which E! said was one of its highest-rated editions in Globes history.